Indianapolis Times, Volume 40, Number 188, Indianapolis, Marion County, 27 December 1928 — Page 4
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SCR : PPS - H OW A/to
Public Ownership Have the people of this city the brains and capacity to own and operate a gas company? In the very near future, the people will be told that they, as a body are incapable of owning any such enterprise. Os course, the plea will be so soft coated as not to offend any individual. The suggestion will be left that if every citizen were the sort of the pian or women then addressed, the plan would be perfectly safe. But the others —the man next door or some one off in another part of town —would act in some mysterious manner that would immediately throw the whole thing into bankruptcy. Every effort will be made to bring doubt and uncertainty into the minds of the people and to attempt to persuade them that they will be really better off if they pay dividends on millions of unearned dollars than they would be to own the property itself and get gas at cost. The fight against public ownership is not confined to the owners of the certificates in this gas company. Some of these have a gambler’s interest in the matter. They have purchased certificates at much more than their face value on the off chance that federal courts will be so meticulous in their reverence for private property as to give them something that does not belong to them. The larger fight comes from a well organized group of financial nterests that have been attempting to teach the people, in schools, through newspapers and on lecture platforms, that there is something very dangerous in the people, as a whole, owning any public utility. That fight has been rather successful. Some of their methods have been exposed in Washington. Others, more subtle, can be detected in every community. The people, of course, do own and operate some rather valuable properties and no one would suggest •that they be turned over to private interests. The postoffice is the most often cited, because that affects more people and is more easily understood. Public ownership of that utility has never been attacked. Some day, perhaps the people will be wise enough to annex the telegraphs and telephones, which should be a part of the postal system, as they are in some European countries. The high cost of telephones and telegraphs would be cut, if that were ever put into operation. The people also own their own schools in competition with private schools. No one would suggest that the people have no capacity for that utility. The people also own their own street cleaning departments, a public utility. They own garbage systems and operate them. They own a lot of other utilities that are no more essential than heat. The status of the gas company is well defined and admitted. The people have built up in twenty-five years a very valuable property which was designed for them. All parties understood that the people were to own it at the end of this term. There remains only the question of how to make the transfer of certificates and the bigger one of whether the people can be induced NOT to take what is theirs. If you happen to hear a plea against public ownership, just ask yourself whether YOU believe that YOU are capable of owning anything. Do the people really need a guardian? Are we still children when we act as a community or have we grown up? America in Europe America is to take a hand again in the basic international problem of war reparations settlement, unofficially, of course, in the role of “observer." This political fiction is maintained as a sop to the isolationists among us. It is also a convenient but shaky method in line with the general United States post-war policy of exerting a maximum of influence on European affairs with a minimum of responsibility. Economic realities, however, have a way of confounding political myths. That v'as the case with the Versailles treaty, with which the victors sought to make vanquished Germany pay for the war. Some years later the international statesmen discovered the ancient nursery axioms about getting blood out of a turnip and killing the goose that laid the golden egg. There was a limit to what Germany could pay. Then came the disquieting discover!' that international debts are not paid in gold, but in goods, and that these German goods-in-payment flooding into victory countries would dislocate local industry. When the Dawes commission met four years ago, the politicians had been forced by economic facts to call in bankers and economists. But the Versailles myth still was so strong that the politicians would not allow the public in the victorious countries to face the disagreeable fact that no one “won” the war. Specifically, the Dawes plan did not fix a definite total amount of reparations, or a permanent annual apportionment of German payments, nor did it provide for commercialization of German railway and industrial bonds through sale to private investors. The new experts’ commission, which is to meet this winter, is to finish if possible the job started by the first commission. Again the Washington government has stated it has “no objection” to American experts serving on such a commission unofficially. Though the Americans will have a status on paper as mere individuals, they of course will dominate the new commission, as Dawes, Young and Robinson dominated the last. Here, again it is a case of economic realties overcoming political myths. For the outstanding fact is that the United States holds the world’s money bag, and is by necessity the most important factor in any European financial settlement. Americans have another interest in a reparations settlement because of the huge American investments which have grown up in Germany since the war. German reparations so far have been paid chiefly by borrowing from the United States. But the Washington government has even a more direct interest. Great Britain, France and the others will not pay the United States more on war debts than they themselves receive from Germany and each other. The reiterated official Washington denial of connection between reparations and w r ar debts is only another part of that political myth W'hich is being battered down by economic facts. Those war debts to us never will be pnu. They
The Indianapolis Times (A SCKIPPS-lIOWARII NEWSPAPER) Owned and published daily (exeept Sunday) by The Indianapolis Times Publishing Cos., 214-220 W. Maryland Street, Indianapolis, Ind. Price in Marion County 2 cents —10 cents a week: elsewhere, 3 cents—l 2 cents a week. BO I'D HOY W. HOWARD. FRANK G. MORRISON. Editor. President. Business Manager. PHONE— RILEY .5551. , THURSDAY. DEC. 27. 1928. Member of United Press, Scripps Howard Newspaper Alliance, Newspaper Enterprise Association, Newspaper Information Service and Audit Bureau of Circulations. “Give Light and the People Will Find Their Own Way.”
have been cancelled already from 50 to 75 per cent with the sugar-coated phrase of “funding agreement,” an acceptable subterfuge to the American public which is horrified by the word “cancellation.” There will be further cancellation before the sixty-two year period of the funding agreements has passed, most economists and bankers agree. This twin problem of German reparations and allied debts is indicative of the general relation between the United States and Europe. For better or for worse, we are in Europe and in to stay. Even apart from any ideal of international co-operation or any humanitarian purpose, the United States has to take its share of European responsibility as a sheer matter of self-interest and self-protection. Mills’ Enforcement Plan The main problem of prohibition enforcement is to prevent the illegal diversion of alcohol, according to Major Chester P. Mills, former prohibition administrator for New York, who has been awarded the $25,000 prize offered by W. C. Durant for “the best and most practicable plan for making the Eighteenth Amendment effective.” Diverted alcohol anS liquors provide most of the illicit beverage being drunk. Mills says. He therefore proposes an effective system for the issuance and control of permits, of which there are now about 150.000 in force, and closer supervision of manufacture by the government. Mills’ suggestion appeals to common sense. It should be possible for the government to put into effect the program he outlines. If no alcohol at all were diverted, however, the problem of smuggling and the hidden still would remain. Smuggling can be checked, Mills believes, by unceasing vigilance and patrol. There is no assurance in his plan, however, that stills would not multiply to supply the demand for liquor if other sources were cut off. During the last fiscal year, 18,980 stills were seized by federal officers, and it is estimated that these comprised only about 10 per cent of the stills actually in operation. Separation of enforcement from politics, respect for personal liberty in enforcement, and other suggestions Mills makes are sound. The fundamental fact at the bottom of the enforcement problem would nevertheless remain if all Mills’ recommendations were put into effect. That fact is that the population as a whole has not accepted prohibition ,and does not regard violation of the Volstead act as a crime. Coolidge Plays Some men learn late in life to play. At some commercial excursion to Cape May or Atlantic City they happen upon the shuffle board, and existence takes on new colors. With others it may be golf, or volley ball, or shooting clay pigeons, or hunting. To such a whole new world is opened. So it is with Calvin Coolidge. Evidently there was something important left out of his boyhood and youth. Something that is supplied by the corner lot baseball nine and the old swimmin’ hole. We are not deceived by these presidential trips to Georgia and Virginia. Calvin stumbled upon fishing and shooting. For the first time in his life he is playing something besides politics. May he enjoy his new found youth! A humorist on a New York newspaper was struck by an automobile the other day. He is now equipped by experience to write a wise-crack about pedestrians and drivers and really mean it. A Cleveland judge refused a divorce to a woman who complained’ that her husband refused to shave over the week end. the judge holding it was his right to grow whiskers if he pleased. It was a close shave, though.
David .Dietz on Science .■ ■—— Struggle for Existence No. 244 FROM the viewpoint of the physiologists, a plant or animal is an organism with a twofold purpose. The first is to grow and remain alive. The second is to hand down life through the ages. This is not to say that there are not other purposes to life. But other purposes are the concern of the philosopher, the artist and others. They are not the primary concerns of the physiologist. These two primary aims, however, have been recognized in other fields than physiology and they have been stated in various w r ays. For example, it is sometimes said that self-preservation and preservation of the race are the first laws of nature.
‘AMOEBA GREATIY MAGHIfIED NUCLEUS flcW
the competition of other living creatures. The story of evolution Is the story of the development of better means of meeting the battle with environment. The development from the one-celled organism like the amoeba to multi-celled organisms culminating in man, is the development of better mechanisms for winning in the struggle for existence. The amoeba has very little structure. It consists of a single cell. The structural differences are slight. There is a tiny dark spot in the cell, the so-called nucleus. A thin membrane or covering surrounds the cell. Reactions of the amoeba are reactions as a whole. The amoeba moves in any direction merely by distending part of itself in that direction. When it comes in contact with a particle of food it takes it through any part of the membrane which comes in contact with it. The amoeba reproduces by splitting in two, causing two to exist where formerly there was only one amoeba. In the multi-cellular organisms, specialization is to be observed, even in the very simplest. Certain portions of the organism form a definite mouth, other parts are concerned entirely with locomotion, and so on. The physiologist is interested in studying the functions of the various parts of a living organism, _
M IP TRAC Y SAYS “The Holiday Death Toll Is Not So Stupendous as to Cause Any Alarm Among Thinking People:’
WITH a few sections still to be heard from, the United Press reports a total of 170 violent deaths in the country over Christmas. Os these, 107 were due to traffic accidents, thirty-one to fire, and the remainder to drowning, shooting and suicides. The total is not as bad as it sounds. We ' get the idea that Christmas and other holidays have a big casualty list, but that is because we forget to compute it at other times. Asa matter of fact, deaths by violence in this country average around two hundred and fifty a day. That goes for Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, as well as week-ends, and for week-ends as well as holidays. Automobiles kill between 60 and 75 a day on the average, from 35 to 40 commit uicide, and from 25 to 30 are mur ered. The United Press report, even though incomplete, suggests that this Christmas was below the average, rather than above it, so far as violent deaths arc concerned. an a Booze Toll Exaggerated AS FOR poison liquor, which is credited with only seven deaths during the celebration, its part in the picture has been exaggerated out of all proportion. More people die in their homes than from poison liquor, more are drowned, and more are burned to death. Five times as many are murdered, seven times as many commit suicide, and ten times as many are run down by automobiles. If we are going to prove causes by effects, the first essential is to develop a sense of proportion. The average man is too bewildered by numbers to make their meaning clear. When he hears that a hundred people died, no matter what the cause or circumstance, he jumps to the conclusion that it is not only unusual, but a tragedy. Unless it is called to his attention, he does not realize that there are six or seven thousand funerals in 1 this country every day. a a a Screen Our Woes THIS is a big country—big not j only in area, population, wealth and resources and energy, but in , pain, suffering and misfortune. It | already has twice as many in its j cemeteries as are living. The dis- j ference will widen as time goes on. \ Among other things, we have learned to screen our woes. Sickness forms no such part of home life as it once did. The dead are taken to undertaking parlors, prisons and asylums are located in isolated places, crimes and disasters attract no more than lc-eal interest, unless they are sensational, and no one bothers to keep us acquainted with the sum total, except on special occasions like summer Sundays and holidays. There is hardly a form of death a peculiar sickness, or a curious accident, but what occurs so frequently in this country that it could be made the basis of terror if its toll were reported faithfully from day to day. To a measurable extent we create a warped idea of life, its danger and vicissitudes, with spotty reports and computations. u tt tt Terror Is Spread THE flu epidemic is a case in point. We have suffered quite as much through alarm and through activities due to it as from the disease. Hundreds of schools have been closed, as well as quite a few colleges. On the one hand, people have been warned to keep out of crowds, while on the other, children and students exposed to the disease have been scattered all over the map. Patent medicines have enjoyed a boom trade, doctors have been worked overtime, and mothers have worried themselves sick. Meanwhile, the probabilities are that cancer, heart disease, and kidney trouble have taken as great a toll of life during the last six weeks. The flu is dangerous, to be sure, but so is the old-fashioned cold. bub YOU can reach a point where the remedy is worse than the disease, where it causes more commotion. more anxiety, more loss of sleep and money. You also can reach a point where you become so interested in some particular ailment, or risk, as to forget other and equally imminent perils. The man who would keep well can not lose sight of everything else for the sake of remembering the flu. He has to think of his liver, his rheumatism, the kind of food that gives him indigestion, the flivver that dashes at him every time he crosses a street, the constitutional .weakness he may have inherited, the latest particular malady to which he may have been exposed. He has to keep in mind a dozen varieties of germ and bootlegger. He can not concentrate on any one thing without taking a chance of being caught off guard, can not settle down to the comfortable notion that life has ceased to be complex, that it contains only one or two pitfalls, and that if he avoids them, he has made himself safe. A sense of proportion is necessary not only to preserve health, but to make good use of our faculties.
“The struggle for existence” is the name sometimes given to the battle which living creatures wage to stay alive and to reproduce. The struggle for existence is waged against environment using that word in its to include not only the forces of nature, but broadest sense
This Date in U. S. History
• December 27 1760—News of the death of King George II reached Boston. 1776—Congress gave Washington dictatorial powers in military matters. 1863—General exchange of Civil War prisoners; Federals gave up 121,900 prisoners for HOW 7 - - -
THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES
This is the last of a series of three articles m climate and tuberculosis. BY DR. MORRIS FISHBEIN Editor Journal of the American Medical Association and of Hygeia, the Health Magazine. THE eminent authority in tuberculosis, Dr. Francis Trudeau, once said that patients with that disease did well in the desert, upon the mountain or in the middle of the ocean. However, perpetual sunshine will not prevent tuberculosis and excessive sunshine is exceedingly irksome to many people. To establish the current view of this problem Dr. James Alexander Miller surveyed the available medical literature and studied the records of patients in various portions of the United States. Asa result of* his study he has drawn certain conclusions which should be borne in mind by every person with tuberculosis w’ho may contemplate a change of climate. Here they are: 1. The regimen of regulated rest and exercise, proper food and openair life, is the fundamental essential in the treatment of tuberculosis. Suitable climatic environment makes this open-air life more easy, enjoyable and beneficial. 2. When these essentials are as-
SANTA CLAUS has returned to the North Pole. Homes are littered with broken baubles; Christmas trees are shedding their sideburns; candy elephants have their tails bitten off; talking dolls have lost their voices; mechanical toys are stalled and jumping jacks are jammed; children are reporting indigestion; adults are figuring whether they gained or lost, and turkeys are being warmed up. tt B tt Those men are right who oppose letting cities count their alien inhabitants to get more representatives in congress, for we might as well count the inhabitants of European cities and give our cities ail increased representation at Washington on that account. American congressmen are chosen to represent Americans, not foreigners and none but Americans should be counted. tt B tt Another thought is pertinent in connection with this congressional reapportionment—if the representation of southern states were reduced in proportion to the disfranchisement of colored voters, as provided by the constitution, it would not be necessary to reduce the representation of one northern state. tt B B This California woman may havo heard radio music which was picked up by her range while she was cooking, but no woman is optimistic enough to expect a dish pan to pick up any melody while she’s washing dishes. B tt tt Those people who have fairly deluged Mr. Coolidge with Christmas food for the last seven years didn’t send him much this year, and in a year from now they won’t even send him any cranberries. B It tt Governments are not very particular about your ancestry when they want you to go forth and get shot full of holes, but how they can high hat you w’hen the war is over! Ralph Heard of Boston can’t get a passport because there’s a defect in his birth certificate, but he w r as sufficiently born to fight twentytwo months overseas. tt B B Since Mr. Coolidge has strengthened the Republic by restoring the rights of Langley of Kentucky, who was sent to the penitentiary for conspiring to violate the liquor law while a member of congress, Langley will probably be rewarded by being made a United States senator or something.
U 1 JjN v> A % •Smsfi be 5 i\ g ffE = BEHIND/ o; Wllmw iooku 7 7^^ 77 1. 7 77.77
Ten Rules for Treating Tubercular
Reason
Better Late Than Never
CLIMATE AND TUBERCULOSIS—NO. 3
sured, a change of climate is of definite value in a considerable number, probably the majority of cases, but w’ith the proper regimen many cases will do w ell in any climate. 3. Any change of climate involving the fatigue of travel is contraindicated in acute cases with fever or hemorrhage, or in very far advanced and markedly debilitated cases. Absolute bed rest is the one essential here. 4. No patient should be sent away in search of climate who cannot afford to stay the reasonably to be expected time and to have the necessary food, lodging and care. 5. Competent medical advice and supervision are essential. 6. One of the most valuable assets of change is the education of the patient. This may, of course, be obtained in a suitable environment without reference to climate, as in a sanatorium near home. 7. Selection of a suitable locality is an individual problem for every patient, depending upon his temperament, tastes and individual reaction to environment, as well as the character of his disease. The advising physician should have an appreciation of these as well as a knowledge of the particu-
1\ inf ‘ • •*
By Frederick LANDIS
THE President has increased the duty on onions from a cent to a cent and a half a pound, but if there’s anything in this world that needs no protection, its an onion. B tt B We are glad Vanderbilt gave his son a million dollars, because it enabled the family to get its name in the papers in connection w’ith something besides a divorce suit.
Common Bridge Errors AND HOW TO CORRECT THEM BY W. W. WENTWORTH
1. FAILURE TO DRAW TRUMPS AT THE RIGHT TIME.
North (Dummy) ♦ K 8 S? J 5 o Q J 10 1 •4 A Q .1 9 2 West— East—--4JIOB 6 4 A Q 42 (? 9 7 6 S? < 2 A93 0K876 * s 7 4 None L———l 54 9 South (Declarer) 47 4 3 (JAKQIOS $A 5 2 4 K 10 The Bidding—ln this illustration, South opens with one heart. West passes. North bids no-trump to inform his partner that he does not hold normal support in hearts. East passes. On the second round South bids two hearts and all pass. Deciding the Play—West leads the spade jack East wins two tricks in spades and then leads the 6 of hearts, which is won in the dummy with the heart jack. What suit should Declarer now play from Dummy? The Error —Declarer in order to finesse plays the diamond queen from Dummy. West captures it with the diamond king and leads the 8 of spades, which is captured by East, who trumps it with the 7 of hearts. East plays the 8 of spades and West captures the trick by
lar environment to which the patient is being sent. Contentment and reasonable comfort are essential. 8. There is no universally ideal climate. For each patient there may well be a most favorable environment if we are wise enough to find it. 9. There is a reasonable amount of evidence that certain medical types of cases are more favorably influenced by certain conditions of climate, everything else being equal. For example, reasonably cold, dry, variable climate, such as Is found on the mountains, for young or vigorous constitutions which will react well. Dry, sunny climates for laryngeal cases and those with marked catarrhal secretions. Equable mild climates at low altitudes for the elderly and those of nervous temperaments, as well as for those with arteriosclerosis, weak hearts or marked to dyspnoea. 10. Successful selection of climate and environment for cases of tuberculosis requires w’ide knowledge of human nature, of places and of the disease. This can be acquired only by patience, skill and experience.
MR. CLAUS GOES tt v m CUT OUT ALIENS tt tt tt NO CRANBERRIES
IT’S strange that Kaiser Bill should control enough people to give the German republic any worry, since he sacrificed every other family’s children, yet kept his own ten miles from the firing line, since he started out to annihilate democracy and wound up by annihilating the distance from , Berlin to Holland, since he held himself forth as a defiance-breathing bear and turned out to be a white-livered coward. BUB There's no accasion to get excited over Sir Oliver Lodge’s statement that the world will have no end, since you don’t have to be a great scientist like Lodge to know that anything that's round can't have an end.
trumping with the 3 of hearts. After that Declarer wins the remaining tricks and makes the contract. However. game has been sacrified by the failure to draw trumps immediately. The Correct Method—Uupon the exposure of the Dummy, Declarer plans his campaign. He bears in mind that delay in drawing trumps may be fatal as far as game is concerned. He is not satisfied to make his contract; he strives to capture the additional tricks w'hich will make his final effort worth while. He looks for an established suit and finding that he has such a suit—clubs!—draw's trumps immediatey, exhausting opponent of them. After that he w'ins enough club tricks to make game. This is quite simple, yet an evening seldom passes at. the bridge table when some player does not fail to draw trumps immediately under similar circumstances. The Principle—When you hold an established side suit and have command of the trump suit, draw trumps at the earliest opportunity. (Copyright, 1928. Ready Reference Publishing Company)
Daily Thought
Howbeit thou art just in all that is brought upon us; for thou hast done right, but we have done wickedly.—Nehemiah 9:33. B B B IF punishment reaches not the mind and makes not the will supple, It hardens the offender.— Locke.
DEC. 27, 1928 k
IT SEEMS TO ME B tt By HEY WOOD BROUN
Ideal and opinions expressed In this colling are tiiosc of one of America’s ost interesting; writers and are presented without regard to their agreement with the editorial attitude of this paper. The Editor.
HARPO MARX, the actor, has hit upon a scheme which may revolutionize the social life of every sensitive individual. This plan, if
I
only generally adopted, would serve to loosen the grip of the nightmare which stalks along behind all of us fuzzy - headed folk at parties. Or on the street or in the club, for that matter. Is there a man alive who has never been confronted by some unfamiliar individual who cried
out suddenly, “of course, you don’t remember me.” Few have character enough to say, “That’s right. Who In hell arc. you?” The familiar rejoinder, as I know it, runs, “Why, don’t be ridiculous. I remember you very well.’* It’s not good enough. The pest bent upon recognition will never let you get away with that. He may say, “Where did we meet?” That offers a way of escape. “At college.” is a pretty fair answer. Or “on top of a bus.” The deadly attack consists of his fixing you suddenly with a bony hand and demanding “what's my name?” A. Rose. it tt A Rose I HAVEN’T the least idea why he should want to know. The correct answer will leave him no wiser than before. But as a matter of fact, he seeks your destruction. He wants to make a fool out of the man who has forgotten. No one (except politicians, preachers and saloon keepers) is under any obligation to remember the silly names of all his friends. But the victim caught in such a trap is bound to blush and stammer. The odds are enormously against you if you seek to guess. I don’t suppose there is more than an ounce or so of unadulterated malice in the world. In me, I’m afraid, there is less than what the chemists call “a trace.” And yet I am cordially hated by a good many simply on account of being bunglej brained about names. For a time I did work out a system which had a few advantages. “Why, hello. Buck,” I used to say. Practically every male person in the world has been called Buck at one time or another. But this plan was I no use at all with women. BUB Cousin of John Doe THE scheme of Marx is daring. He has established the arbitrary postulate that every woman whom he has to introduce shall be called “Miss Benson.” It was his custom to bring Kibitzers from his show (i.e.. “Animal Crackers”) to the poker game, and each time he said “This is Miss Benson’-’ or “two Miss Bensons” as the case might warrant. Harpo Marx counts quite readily through the smaller numbers. . In my naive way I wondered whether all these girls, so various in appearance, could be sisters. Then one night he showed up with an entire dancing unit consisting of twenty members. Gravely he went down the line, and each turned out to be a Benson. tt B B Benson for Beginning WHY can’t society be like that and accept the fact that every' young woman .is a Benson on first, acquaintance? If friendship ripens there will be time enough for the man to learn that she is in actuality La Verne St. Clair or Kitty O’Connor. Benson should be plenty good enough to begin on. It has enough of familiarity and enough of respect. In course of time other identification might become necessary. Naturally one would fall into descriptive names. And, by the way, all names ought to be descriptive. There would be Freckled Benson, Cross-Eyed Benson, Benson With the Big Blue Eyes, and Miss Who-Lives-on-192d-street, and Has-to-be-Taken-Home-in-a-Taxi Benson. If we parents had possessed sufficient vision they might much more appropriately have christened me Second Section Broun. With such a name people would know where to look for me. Asa matter of fact, no child should be permanently christened in infancy. u tt n Just Plain Mary THIS may explain one of the reasons why so many babies are called “Mary,” you can’t go far wrong with that. It does not wear conspicuously with any type. Somebody objects that it is overplain and has no romantic allure. But I have only to mention two—Garden and Pickford—to quash that accusation. As for the more fancy flights, such as Desiree, how can anybody tell that before the age of 18? And, of course, there ought to be a law forbidding parents from burdening a helpless child with any such handicap as Pansy, Edythe or Millicent. Indeed, the statute should be broad enough to afford even more protection. In the United States no race horse can be officially named until the governing body has accepted the title suggested by the owner. Children are certainly as important as colts or mares, and the bureau of vital statistics in each community might be empowered to refuse the wishes of the parents. I do not think it would be tyranny for a duly elected officer to say firmly, “Madam, I am sorry, but the great city of New York will not permit you to call this sweet baby Deidre Dooley.”